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Eclairs

Jan 30 2006 - 8:25pm

Eclairs

Want to impress your sweetheart this Valentine's Day? REALLY impress your sweetie? Then make these éclairs.

They look like they'd be a ton of work, don't they? I thought they would be, but they really aren't that hard. From first flipping open the cookbook (the 1997 edition of the Joy of Cooking) to the moment I was getting blissed out eating them was under two hours. Not bad at all, and fresh out of the oven these were the best éclairs I've ever had.

Eclairs

There are three parts to éclairs: the pastry (pâte à choux), the filling (crème pâtissière), and the topping (chocolate ganache). If you are strapped for time you could cut corners on one or more of the parts by doing things like using frozen puffed pastry for the pastry, pudding or whipped cream for the filling, or some other frosting for the topping. Take a look at the recipes before doing so though: none of the pieces are that hard. There are a few places where you have to bring things to a boil carefully to prevent scalding, but I've found that if you warm the ingredients in the microwave before combining them in your sauce pan you can easily cut 10 or 15 minutes of stirring out of the process.

Choux Paste (pâte à choux)

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup milk

1 stick (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter

1/2 teaspoon salt

4 eggs

Combine the water, milk, butter, and salt in a small saucepan. Bring it to a boil. Stir in the flour and, while mixing, cook another minute or 2 to eliminate excess moisture. Transfer to a bowl and let cool for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Beat in one egg at at time. When they have all been beaten in and the paste is smooth and shiny, set aside to cool. The paste may be use immediately or covered and refrigerated for later use.

Pastry Cream (Crème Pâtissière)

1/3 cups sugar

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons corn starch

4 egg yolks

1 1/3 cups milk

3/4 teaspoon vanilla

Combine the sugar, flour, corn starch, and egg yolks in a bowl. Beat with an electric mixer for 2 minutes until the mixture is thick and pale yellow.

In a small saucepan, bring the milk to a boil. Gradually pour the milk into the egg mixture, stirring it in as you do so. When fully combined, pour all of it into the saucepan and bring to a boil, whisking constantly. Boil for 1 to 2 minutes then remove mixture from heat. Stir in the vanilla and set aside to cool.

Cover the top with wax paper or parchment to prevent a skin from forming. This cream may be refrigerated for a day or two before use or used immediately.

Chocolate Ganache

3/4 cup heavy cream

8 ounces semisweet or bittersweet chocolate

Heat the cream. Stir in the chocolate and continue heating and stirring until all of the chocolate is melted.

Éclairs: Assembly

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Form small logs out of the Choux paste on a baking sheet. If you have a pastry bag with large tips, you can squeeze them out neatly. I do not, so I just formed the logs with a spoon and my fingers.

These were about an inch across and 3 to 4 inches long.

Bake the pastries for 15 minutes at 400 degrees. Reduce the oven to 350 degrees and bake for another 10 to 30 minutes, depending on the size of the eclairs you are making.

When they are golden brown, turn the oven off. Poke a hole in the small end of the eclair and place them back in the oven for another 10 minutes to dry out. Remove the eclairs from the oven and let them cool a few minutes.

For the topping, dip or dribble the eclairs in the chocolate ganache.

To fill the eclairs, you can either use a pastry bag and squirt the pastry cream in through the drying hole as I did. Or you can slice the eclairs lengthwise and scoop the filling inside and place the top half back on top.

There you have it: chocolate, creamy bliss.

The eclairs keep OK for a few days in the refrigerator in an air tight container, but they are not nearly as good as when they are first assembled. Take my advice: make all of the elements in the same session, bake them up and make a fresh pot of coffee, and enjoy them immediately. You won't be sorry!

Comments

At christmas one year we were making Gingerbread houses with the kids at my sons school and for pastry bags we used heavyduty Zip lock bags, I think this would work for your large tiped pastry bag just cut a hole equal to the size to tube that you want. I'm going to try this later and let you know how it works ( I'm going to try a milk bag, nice and tough)

At cake decorating shops you can usually pick up a few
plastic disposables bags that the tips fit in...
I myself prefer the large nylon washable bags, Tala use to make them along with large tips.
The plastic ziplocks I find great for chocolate icing for the top of the eclairs, chocolate is so messy.;-))))qahtan

To avoid having your choux shells collapse, bake them until the color of the cracks in the dough are as brown as the rest of the exterior. By doing so you really don't need to poke holes to let them dry.

To make the pastry cream easier to pipe, take it out of the fridge 45 minutes to an hour before you use it. Then whisk it aggressively. It's texture will change from a wobbly, rubbery state to a smooth cream.

I made them this weekend and they were great. Not difficult either. My one area that could use work is my filling. I think my egg yolks are smaller here and it seemed dry in the mixing bowl. Other than that, no problem. They tasted good and looked good

And what for their wandering eyes did appear? Picture this: A table with two pots full of pudding, vanilla and chocolate, and a fresh hot cookie sheet of round little puffs being added to a heaped shallow basket of cooling puffs. Whip cream and chocolate to dip. It doesn't take much to imagine what spoonfulls of fun everyone had making and eating their own little snacks. :)!

These were fun to make, but I did find two minor problems that other chefs might wish to be aware of. One was that the ganache recipe made far too much: especially in order for the chocolate flavor not to cloy the eclair flavor, I would recommend a 1/4 recipe (I made six eclairs). (Also, I tried a white chocolate with lemon zest ganache in addition to the bittersweet ganache; both were super, but the white choc let the pastry and custard flavors come through much more.) Also, my six pastries needed much more time in the oven than I gave them -- 15 min at 400, then 15 at 350, then 10 to "dry out" in the off oven was just not enough. Next time I would try 20 at 400, 20 at 350, and 15 at Off. But, of course, they were still excellent.

The reason for oil is since the water will boil before the butter melts the water will be evoporating changeing the amount of total water in the mix the oil will be ready as soon as the water boils that wat you can be sure that the amount is correct

eggs 8 oz or more you want the mix soft for eclars or stiff if you are making french crulers

for crulers add some rum flavor to the mix and fry at 350 in deep oil

eclears we baked at 450 all the way through till crisp and we egg washed them for a shiny and crisper crust

you can frezz the baked shells and fill and finish when ready to serve

on joseph"s day make this mix medium stif bag into a ring shape isung a fine point number 6 or 7 tube put them one or two at a time in a 450 oven and bake them for about 2-3 minuts then take them out ov the oven and emeditily place them top down in 325 -350 degree deep oil cook for a minute or so and flip them over and cook them for a mother minute or so, if they need it flip than once more and finish

fill them with the cream and cheries or cannoile cream and cover them with powdered sugar and that is the clasic St' Joseph pastry (St.Josepg Cakes) for St.Joseph's day in march

Well now I have no excuse; I'm making eclairs this week! My son asked about them recently and I had to put him off because I thought butter was crucial to the pastry part; what a nice surprise to find differently!

I'll probably just use my usual non-dairy custard for the filling, it's pretty close to the real thing...

I just wanted to thank you for this recipe; I didn't feel like having a cake for my birthday this year, so made these instead. What a hit! In fact, the whole family said to say thank you!

Thanks also to Norm, who indicated oil instead of butter in the pate a choux; it never would have occurred to me to try these without dairy, but having seen that, I realized the cream would be easy to convert (I used a mix of 1/3 each coconut, rice, and soy milks instead of real milk), and they were wonderful!

Now the only problem will be stopping myself from making them once a week...

I followed the recipe exactly... and my little eclairs were looking amazing in the oven, all nice and puffed up, but as soon as I took them out (to poke the holes) they became FLAT (before I even started poking holes).

I think I underbaked mine too, though only slightly; they were a little light in colour, but they also kind of sagged after I took them out. Not enough to prevent filling, but they weren't as dramatic as when they first came out, either. Didn't affect the taste though!

You said you don't poke holes in yours; do you split them to fill them, or is there another secret?

To avoid the sagging try this: After baking, turn the oven off, slightly crack the door of the oven open and allow them to sit in the warm oven for about 10 minutes to dry out a bit more. Make sure you turn the oven off!

It's 11:30 pm and I am waiting for my eclairs to bake! I hate this site for that reason! I was doing so well with trimming down my weight and I have to stumble on all these recipes. These look so good, besides the fact that I told someone at work about this site and he brought some eclairs in for me to taste. So my eclairs are baking, my pizza dough is in the fridge, my sourdough is rising...

Great tip on the use of ziploc bag for forming the eclairs. Also will be trying the use of a a plastic injector that my colleague said worked very well for filling.

I'm just an old man,teaching granddaughters how to cook.We tried many of the cookie press things,bags,and about every thing to fill twinkies,and other things.Here is my problem solved,to the "blow out the side",with filling!! After getting off of the pans,just cool enough to handle,I would shove a drinking straw,all the way through,really Mcdonalds,big straw works good,but my final thing was a stainless steel tube , 3/8 inch x 10 inches long.Now,I would cut a straw,at angle,and push up inside the gun nozzle,about 5 inches long.Now,you can fill the gun,with what ever filling you want,hold the straw in and push all the way through the cake,and start mashing the handle,and back out with gun.They fill so easy,and all the way through,no blow outs.It might be crude to some of the great minds out there,but it turns out the greatest eclairs,twinkies and cupcakes,for the home.You will have to get used to the flow,and the thickness of filling,but works great for us!! These little girls learn so fast,and last night,we made one of King Arthur Flour Cakes;"Lemon Cream Cakes";The Baking Sheet,winter edition.With a little help,a 5 and 12 year old,made a pretty cake!!

After making these wonderfully delicious treats for my Family and frieds (and it being my first atempt at pastries) I quickly relized that my next attempt at something even more yummy will have to be bigger and better. This recipe is very very good. Who knew that a guy from SO Cal could whip up something so delicious. Thanks for the recipe

If you don't have a pastry bag you can use a ziplock bag. Fill it with the choux paste (the eclair dough) and then cut off one of the bottom corners. You can use it to pipe out the dough so you have uniform eclairs. Just make sure you don't cut off a HUGE piece or they will be too big, if you don't cut it big enough you can aways cut off more.

Try this....400 for 15 min,...375 for 15 min, 350 for 15 min and another 15 at 300....then let them cool completely before filling or freezing for later use...never fails for me. I do however use a convection oven....I would also caution against opening the oven during the first 30 min of baking...no hole poking necessary with this method. I also prefer to top them with a melted semi-sweet chocolate as opposed to ganache...it's a little simpler and the pure chocolate acts to complement the other ingredients instead of overiding as the ganache can. For an added dimension...scrape the seeds of one whole vanilla bean into the pastry creme...One other tip...for piping in the filling...place two small holes in the bottom...pipe gently until sides bulge...switch to the other hole and pipe until it comes out the other side...then wipe the bottom clean...the filling should be firm enough not to ooze and will form a little skin in a matter of minutes...

All I have to say is WOW. I was having a bunch of friends over for dinner last friday so I decided to try this recipe for desert. I made the shells Thursday night as I knew that the oven would be occupied with the Prime Rib most of Friday afternoon. I made the Pastry cream and the Ganache on friday and filled the shells. All I have to say is these were the most amazing eclairs I have ever had. Best compliment of the nght was from a chef who workes at a 5 star restaurant here on the srtip in Las Vegas who said he wished his pastry chef could make eclairs like that! This will have a prominant place in my recipe box from now on.

I completely burnt the cream puffs I was trying to make earlier this year following the repeated bake times. By the end of it they were completely black (such heartbreak!). But this thread has inspired me to give it another go, I just might have to adjust the temperatures or times, my oven is quite finnicky. Those eclairs do look delicious though! My stomach literally grumbled at the site of them. Nice work :)

I was amazed out how well these turned out, especially since I have only been baking for 4 weeks now. I never would have thought I would be making eclairs but compared to some of the other recipes I have dove into lately the eclairs were fairly easy. I did however combine a few of the comments into the recipe as well as adding a few touches myself. I used the oil instead of butter and bread flour instead of AP. When the cream was finished I though it tasted wonderful but I couldn't resist putting in 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon and a few dashes of nutmeg to please my taste buds. I also made some fresh whipped cream to incorporate into the cream just to give it some fluff. I baked them at 450 until a deep golden brown throughout, approx 30 mins but dont hold me to it, so there was no need for poking holes. Awesome and easy recipe! Would...will make them again soon!

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